Will not make this mistake again.....

[Dub]

Had to go in to work night shift last night.

Felt pretty good this morning.....rained all night and the sun was well up and drying things out on the twenty-five minute drive home. Remembered my clubs were in the backseat....and decided to stop at the course in a nearby neighborhood. Went over to the practice range and bought the LARGE bucket of balls.

Even after stretching and swinging lightly for several minutes, I just couldn't get that loose feeling I wanted before hitting balls. Like a dummy I commenced to hitting them anyway. Poor results were the norm.

After half the bucket I backed off and came to the realization of how stupid I was being. Rapid fire failure!!!!

Luckily....salvation was only a few yards away.....

I took my bag and the remainder of the bucket over to the nearby chipping green and decied to have some real fun. I dumped a dozen in the greenside sand bunker and took my time hitting sandshots. The results were rewarding.

I used the rest for chipping and short pitches over the bunker to various pin positions.

Finished off with some putting practice on some fast downhillers with lots of break.

I'll never....repeat....never do that again.

If I ever feel compelled to getting the GRANDE bucket after work, then I'll start with the short game....and save only a third of it for full swings.

[x-forged]

I agree that its not always the best idea to hit a huge bucket of balls, and you were right for taking the rest of them to the chipping and putting green. I can admit to getting the double eagle basket, which is 280+ golf balls every once in a while. Sometimes it helps with my game if i stay focused and i know what specific things i need to work on.

[Shindig]

One of the things I love about American Golf places is that you pay for however many range balls on a card, and can then get them in any increment you want. I've had days where I said I wanted 13 balls for warm-up, so 13 balls come off the card, out of the machine, into a bucket, and onto the range. Other courses sell tokens in bulk, either literally or on a card.

[Dent]

I personally dont like going to the range much. I need to work on my chipping apparently. If you dont feel loose, dont hit the balls.

[JaY_B]

Michelle Wie (so take with a pinch of salt ) that if your playing well going to the driving range will only ruin your game, and that going to the short game area will be much more beneficial.

[Cizzle]

I agree swinging like a madman hitting ball and after does nothing to help your swing. Did you say you pactice putting and chipping with range balls though? I use them in the sand, but for green side chipping and putting I use the balls I play with. You get much better feel and you play with your actual balls that will help improve. for 60 percent of my bucket, I practice hitting 30-100 yard shots into the driving range. Great practice.

[extremeld]

i think i am fooled by the name "driving range" and as such have always just hit a couple of token irons before blasting away.

i should say i played pitch and putt recently - my god is that a quick way to improve your golf - i am usually a pretty poor pitcher of the ball but after 18 holes on bruntsfield links i my control was better than its ever been

def going to play pitch and putt more often

[jasongst]

Where I found "ball beating" to be the most useful is when I was a relative beginner a few years ago. I found that I absolutely needed that crazy amount of repetition to discover what a good swing felt like, and also to develop the coordination and balance it took just to get the club head to hit the ball. Sometimes this resembled mindlessness. I'd try almost anything, just to see how it felt: I even hit a couple hundred iron shots with a wide open stance and the ball out in front of my feet. It was kinda crazy (and kinda worked, honestly), but it demonstrated to me why a more normal golf swing was a better route.

But in the meantime I was also practicing off the range: taking slow swings in the back yard, trying to match my movements to what I read about in my book. So behind those ball-beating sessions, I had an underlying pathway to improvement. It worked really well.

Not all practice is good practice, this is true. I don't hit massive amounts of golf balls anymore. I don't go to the range nearly as often now, although perhaps I should! The primary reason I avoid the range is because I feel like I've established the foundation of a fundamentally sound swing. It's not perfect, but I'm no longer making radical changes to it. When I do go to the range I always have a purpose in mind. And of course, whenever you lose your swing, the range is a good place to go looking for it.